Monday, January 24, 2011

Last night I attended a screening of director William Friedkin's classic "Sorcerer", a little-seen adventure film starring Roy Scheider as a man on an impossible mission. It is a gritty, nasty, impeccably made film doomed to obscurity probably for the sin of using a supernaturally suggestive title designed to sucker in fans of "The Exorcist." Audiences resented the bait-and-switch, and a perfectly beautiful adventure film got exiled to the slag-heaps of history.

More on that later. But one thing that happened during the Q & A afterward (hosted by Oscar nominee Josh Olson, a lovely guy) was that Friedkin was asked what advice he has for young filmmakers. He didn't hesitate a moment: "Watch Alfred Hitchcock" he said, and then went into a short lecture on the critical importance of modeling the expert work of the masters.

I've talked about this again and again. There is nothing sadder than talking to an amateur, unpublished writer who will not read, for fear that she will accidentally imitate that writer. This is so incredibly wrong-headed, almost exactly the opposite of the successful approach. Invariably, the "best" in any field have an encyclopedic knowledge of those who have come before. Listening to Mike Tyson talk about the vast library of fight films he studied as a teen-ager is a revelation: no, the man was not just a physical marvel and an emotional wrecking machine. He was also a scholar of his sport.

From an NLP perspective, what are the three things you must examine when studying the work of an expert?

1)Belief systems. What does the expert believe about his craft? It's importance? Meaning? The origin of his creativity and focus? What does the expert believe about the nature of human existence? The purpose of life? The worth of art and commerce?

What you are looking for is the DIFFERENCE between the beliefs of successful people, and the beliefs held by...well, not to put too fine a line on it, failures. And it doesn't matter what the arena is...those who succeed have different beliefs from those who fail. Always. In business: failures don't match their actions to their abilities. Try too much or too little. Blame external circumstances with beliefs like "it takes money to make money" and "money is the root of all evil" and so forth. Writers who fail blame the market, avoid submitting their stories for fear of rejection, and so forth.

In relationships, they exhibit an inability to separate their specific and individual experiences from broad-based beliefs about an entire gender. Women and men who harbor the worst kinds of negative stereotypes about each other, or resort to dishonesty in an attempt to get sex. Who, in other words, have no confidence that honesty and openness will be rewarded. They look at their past failures as meaning either that there is something wrong with the opposite sex, or there is something "unfixable" about themselves. Very unfortunate.

And physically, of course...well, I don't want to go into some of the horribly self-defeating internal dialogue people have about their bodies. We store so much negative emotion here that it is rare someone will try to lose weight or gain muscle without a boatload of negative voices trying to convince you that body shifting is impossibly complex, or too risky, or too painful.

We've talked about these things before, but it is critical that you understand the impact of your belief systems on your behaviors.

And by the way: what could one learn about Hitchcock's beliefs from his films? Look at the way he was both hypnotized by, and wary of, human sexuality. Study "Saboteur" or "North By NorthWest" for some clues about patriotism, social obligation, even romance and human psychology. Hitch worked with his writers deeply and carefully, and his influence can be felt in every line of dialogue, every frame of film. By studying Hitch, it is possible to sense the interaction of elements you may not have even considered.

I repeat: if you want to increase your skill and success in a given arena, study the work and lives of people who are more successful than you. Associate with them. Note what they talk about, how they speak of their arenas.

Then...if you have the stomach for it, specifically study the attitudes and work of those who fail in your chosen arena. I promise you: their emotional attitudes are very different, whether it is about relationships, fitness, or success.

About Me

For the last thirty years or so I’ve been a lecturer, coach, novelist and television writer. For the last forty years I’ve been involved variously in the martial arts, and for all my life I’ve studied and enjoyed yoga. Not that I worked at it as hard and honestly as I should have—I’d be a combination of BKS Iyengar and Bruce Lee if I had.
After publishing about three million words of science fiction (including the New York Times bestsellers The Legacy of Heorot and The Cestus Deception) and having about twenty hours of produced television shows (including The Twilight Zone, Outer Limits, Andromeda, and Stargate, as well as four episodes of the immortal Baywatch), I’ve got opinions on the writing life.
After earning black belts in Judo and Karate, and practicing the Indonesian art of Pentjak Silat Serak for the last fifteen, well, I have some opinions there, as well. And having struggled to live consciously since childhood...well, those opinions are probably strongest of all.